Twitter Reactions: Oval Invincibles crush London Spirit in a lopsided affair

Oval Invincibles smothered London Spirit by eight wickets in the 28th The Hundred Women’s fixture to gain a stronghold on the second position in the points tally. Being put into bat first, Spirit lost Naomi Dattani early, with Shabnam Ismail striking, however, a 76-run stand for the second wicket between Tammy Beaumont and Heather Knight had them well in contention of a competitive total.

Beaumont’s 34-ball 42 had six fours, while skipper Knight got five boundaries in her 34 off 29. At 80/1 after 61 balls, Alice Capsey got the latter caught by Georgia Adams to turn the game on its head as Spirit underwent a massive collapse. Within eight balls of Knight’s departure, Beaumont ran herself out, whereas Marizanne Kapp trapped Danielle Gibson lbw for a golden duck before Capsey cleaned up Deandra Dottin to reduce Spirit to 88/5.

While Deepti Sharma did show some resistance as she held an end up in her boundary-less 11-run knock from 14 balls, a flurry of lower-order run-outs alongside Kapp and Tash Farrant’s strike pegged them back completely in the face of a solid second-wicket stand, to fold the innings at an unimposing 103/9.

Invincibles’ easy chase

Chasing nearly a run-a-ball, the Invincibles’ chase was led by Adams’ 34-ball 37 that had five fours. Spirit had their first success early as Sophie Munro got Dan van Niekerk caught behind cheaply, but thereafter, they could not strike until the 54th ball, which was when Fran Wilson was stumped 22 off 21 off Charlotte Dean. Withing a touching distance of the target by then, Kapp ensured to stay unbeaten on 23 alongside Adams to set up an eight-wicket win for her team with 13 balls to spare.

With their fourth win in seven games and nine points in the kitty, the Invincibles look increasingly set to feature in the Eliminator clash, provided they win their final league game. On the other side, Spirit, who have only six points after as many games have their hopes pinned on a string of other permutations and combinations working out in their favor to ensure their qualification.

Here’s how Twitter reacted: